May 30, 2006

Written by

JOE LOMBARDI

THE JOURNAL NEWS

"I may jog a few miles every week, but I don't plan on doing anything intense," said the Yorktown Heights resident, who is wrapping up his freshman season on the Georgia men's track and field team. "I plan to spend the summer relaxing. I need to rest. It's been a long year."

But a good one.

Cuevo hopes to learn today whether he will be heading for the NCAA championships June 7-10 in Sacramento, Calif. He was a member of the Bulldogs' 400-meter relay team that placed fourth in 40.05 seconds on Saturday at the NCAA East Regional in Greensboro, N.C.

"Everyone not in the top three is placed in an at-large list, and there's a committee that decides," Cuevo said. "They said we'll know by Wednesday morning at the latest."

In the preliminaries at the regional meet, Cuevo's relay ran a season-best 39.72.

"I was a little disappointed we ended up getting fourth at finals," Cuevo said. "But at the same time, I can't be angry because it was a pretty fast time."

Cuevo has plenty more of them to come, according to Yorktown coach Keith Smith. Cuevo was, after all, the first athlete in Smith's 20-year tenure at the school to earn a full scholarship for track.

"He's right where I thought he'd be," Smith said. "He went to Georgia with a great attitude and looking forward to competing at the Division I level in the SEC, which is one of the best conferences in the country. He's got a lot of potential for the rest of his career. He'll have a lot more coaches working with him, and he'll get even better. His best is yet to come."

Cuevo, the 2005 Journal News Westchester-Putnam boys track and field performer of the year, is one of the best sprinters in Section 1 history. He arrived at Georgia eager to take on the challenge of competing at a higher level.

But first he had to get used to something else — namely, being nearly 900 miles away from home.

"When I first got here, I knew no one," he said. "It was a hard adjustment being far away from home and not having a support system down here, but at the same time, it taught me how to be independent and depend on myself for things.

"Things are definitely different down here — mainly more subtle things, like the way random strangers will wave to you on the street, or that the pizza's completely different. But I'm starting to enjoy it. I still miss home, but I feel like I'm starting to belong here."

Cuevo also had to adjust to a whole different training regimen.

"Training is much more intense in college, obviously," he said. "We'll run full-speed in our spikes more often. We'll work on form and even watch video, and I'm spending more time in the weight room.

"The biggest difference is that we're more focused on our event. We all did the same workout in high school. In college, the sprinters don't even work out with the distance runners at all."

When fall training ended and the indoor season began, Cuevo was hampered by nagging ankle and hamstring injuries.

But at the SEC championships on May 13, he helped the 400 relay team place fourth in 40.15.

"I wasn't at 100 percent till mid-April," he said.

"I think my body had to get used to the intensity of college before I could respond to the training."

Cuevo has a challenging academic schedule. One of the reasons he selected Georgia, after also considering Pittsburgh, UConn and Rhode Island, was that it offered a major in pharmacy. Though he's decided to switch his major to marketing, his course load remains very heavy.